


superimposed

by Kalael



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-25
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-03-23 17:04:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13792209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalael/pseuds/Kalael
Summary: There are holes in her memory that are less obvious; hours of evenings uncounted, a scented candle burned down to mere centimeters in the kitchen cupboard above the sink, a well worn book she doesn't remember purchasing.(The sealing of an envelope, the press of a stamp, the tattoo of a knot inside Melanie’s chest. )





	1. after-image

**Author's Note:**

> A spotify playlist for you: https://open.spotify.com/user/1155330187/playlist/1vZuButon96hqU1l4MPIi5?si=D_jH7-RHSl-96GjkUXUW5A

It takes quite a bit of digging, but eventually Melanie gets her hands on a polaroid. It’s technically not even a polaroid picture, since it’s one of those trendy instax mini bits, but it’s exactly what she was looking for.

Sasha. The real Sasha. The tiny photo is overexposed and a little bit grainy, but she can make out the glasses and the long hair and the bright beaming smile. Her heart aches at the familiarity. Her mind does not recognize it. It had taken several weeks and a bit of stalking but the embarrassment was more than worth it. Melanie digs through herself, tries to find anything that’s still clinging to her insides; Sasha’s laugh, whether she had nervous habits, the type of clothes she wore. She thinks she remembers a giggle, but it’s chased away with visions of Not Sasha staring solemnly from behind old files.

It’s not _fair_. After everything, why can’t she at least remember this? Melanie cradles the photo in her hands and stares. There’s a mostly empty wine bottle next to her, and a packet of crisps that passed as dinner, but both go ignored as the night settles in on her. The smiling woman in the photo looks relaxed, real. She’s exactly Melanie’s type.

Is that why her heart had whispered ‘no’, so firmly the first time she had met the other Sasha? She remembers talking to the real Sasha the first time they met. She remembers the way her hands got sweaty, how her heart beat quickly, the phantom glide of fingers sliding over her palm as they had shaken hands. She can’t remember what they talked about. She doesn’t remember anything Sasha said. There are holes in her memory that are less obvious; hours of evenings uncounted, a scented candle burned down to mere centimeters in the kitchen cupboard above the sink, a well worn book she doesn't remember purchasing.

There’s an ache behind her eyes, one that feels wrong and different from the itching of tears. The tears are there too, welling up violently and spilling over her cheeks, but the ache is foreign and Melanie cannot look away from the photo. It’s being catalogued, she realizes, and although the thing that owns her is devouring Sasha James’ photo with clinical separation, Melanie takes some small comfort that at least in this way Sasha will never be forgotten.


	2. underlayer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The story of the candle in the kitchen cupboard, burned nearly to the quick, settled above the kitchen sink.

Her laughter is infectious, Melanie realizes, and as Sasha falls into helpless giggles Melanie finds herself cackling away with her. The candle on the coffee table has been burning for hours and the smell of it has permeated Sasha’s hair. Melanie catches the scent now that they’ve collapsed into each other, Sasha’s head tucked against Melanie’s shoulder like the curve of it was meant for her.

“I can’t believe you really thought that was a ghost! It’s so obviously a reflection off the windowpane!” Sasha howls into Melanie’s jumper. Melanie can’t help the fondness lacing through her feigned irritation as she groans. She raises her wine glass emphatically, playing to a camera that isn’t there.

“It was one of our first excursions! We were sloshed!” She punctuates it by taking a heavy swig of her wine, which has Sasha nearly rolling off the couch with laughter.

“Hell, maybe I should have joined you ghost hunters instead of locking myself up in the archives!” She cries. She locks an arm around Melanie’s shoulders to stabilize herself, pulling herself much closer than she had been before. 

“Maybe you should have.” Melanie murmurs. They’re drunk. She knows they are, can feel the buzzing numbness in her fingers and tongue, can see the redness around Sasha’s eyes and cheeks. Sasha’s smile is still so lovely even with her lips chapped and stained with wine.

“I couldn’t now,” Sasha says, equally quiet. Her eyes flicker behind her glasses, glancing between Melanie’s eyes and her mouth. “But I could get you into the library, no problem. Anything you need.”

“Anything?” Melanie can’t help it. She breathes the word like a prayer and Sasha raises her eyes in glorious answer. She’s beautiful. Melanie had been stricken by her the moment they’d met, her looks and her eyes and her glorious goddamn brain. Sasha smiles and Melanie melts, nothing between them now but a hairsbreadth of agonizing space.

“If you ask for it.” Sasha teases. Her lips are so close and she smells like the wine they’ve been drinking. Melanie wonders if she smells the same. Candlelight and wine. But no, Sasha carries that smell of dust with her. The scent of things old and knowledgeable, things meant for the ageless and the undying. Sasha smells like something that Melanie can burrow herself into and make a home in.

“May I kiss you?” She sighs, a desperate thing no matter how much she tries to disguise it. Sasha’s eyes flutter behind her glasses.

“You may.” The permission doesn’t give Melanie time to lean in, because Sasha has already shifted her weight to press forward and kiss Melanie like it’s something finite. The sealing of an envelope, the press of a stamp, the tattoo of a knot inside Melanie’s chest. She hangs onto Sasha’s arms as they tangle around one another with limbs and tongue. It’s messy, and Sasha’s glasses keep bumping into Melanie’s nose, but even though they laugh and readjust it’s nothing short of perfect.

Melanie can’t help but feel that her heart is fit to burst. There’s something here, she thinks, something in Sasha that feels like belonging. The smell of ink and dust and the imprint of wire glasses against their noses as they both press on, kissing and laughing and sighing. The taste of wine, like blood, and the constant cataloguing of the way their mouths slide together.

Melanie writes it all in her mind, a transcription of perfection, and then resigns herself to an evening of wet transcendence. 

“Anything,” Sasha breaths between kisses, her weight settled over Melanie’s hips.

“You, always.” Melanie nearly hiccups.

Sasha’s smile is brilliant. White teeth and crooked glasses and messy long hair. Her beauty imprints itself into Melanie’s mind like a painting, a photograph.

 _You, always._ Melanie thinks.

_Sasha, always._


	3. scrim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The story of a well worn book left under the coffee table, and hours unaccounted for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So fucking glad I've been able to finish this. I moved from the PNW to the Midwest so it's been a bit wild, but I'm happy to get at least a little bit of lesbian porn out there.

“Trysts,” Sasha pauses to lick her thumb and turn the page of the book she’s reading, “seem to lead to some very vengeful spirits.”

“All that residual negative energy.” Melanie nods in agreement as her hands smooth up the narrow plane of Sasha’s back. They’re on Melanie’s couch as usual, lounging together as the rain settles into a drizzle. Melanie watches the drops make lazy vertical patterns down the window pane. Sasha licks her thumb again, turns another page. 

“All those poets.” Sasha hums. The soft crinkling of paper sends Melanie’s eyelids fluttering.

“Tristan and Isolde,” Melanie sighs. “Romeo and Juliet.”

“The more interesting sapphic verses.” Sasha shifts and her left hip bone digs into Melanie’s inner thigh, a pleasure-pain that has her gritting her teeth.

“You’re not even reading poetry.” Melanie points out. Sasha laughs into her copy of _‘Britain’s Most Haunted’_.

“The stories that last are always the same. It doesn’t matter how pretty they dress it up.” Her glasses are smudged and she squints at Melanie through them. It’s endearing and Melanie has never been more in love.

“Then perhaps we’re overdressed?” She teases, sliding her fingers just beneath the hem of Sasha’s tight shirt.

“Crude,” Sasha giggles in response, but she balances herself on her knees as she leans over to put her book beneath the coffee table. Melanie watches the way her spine arches, how her rib cage juts out at the strangely flexible angle. There is a moment of quiet and then Sasha is settling her weight over Melanie’s hips once more. “But I believe you are correct.”

Melanie wants to tattoo poetry over Sasha’s lips and when they kiss she bites like maybe she can create permanence there, an imprint that she licks over and over again. Sasha sighs, a beautiful sound.

“Well then, off with your jumper.” The layers shed clumsily between kisses and giggles, the rain still soft in the background.

“Off with your pants,” Melanie murmurs, and Sasha twists her hips. With that there’s nothing between them anymore, two naked bodies on a well worn couch. It’s nearly cinematic. The warm light of Melanie’s single lamp, the rain, the hitched breaths as Melanie glides her fingers into the wet folds between Sasha’s legs.

“Christ,” Sasha hisses, her legs spreading wider. “Deeper.”

Melanie obliges, dipping two fingers into her and pressing her palm up against Sasha’s clit. The resulting jerk of Sasha’s hips draws out a satisfied gasp from Melanie, and breathy laughter from Sasha.

“More,” Sasha presses the order into Melanie’s neck, kissing and scraping at the thin skin. Melanie feels the tingling at the back of her mind, pleasant and firm.

“Yes.” Melanie agrees, pushing a third finger in. Sasha gasps and the rocking of her hips meets Melanie’s own, a rhythmic sway that falls out of time with the rain. Sasha’s hair gets into Melanie’s mouth and she sputters, laughing. Between Sasha’s gasps and apologies she’s also laughing, hiccups of moans and giggles matching the twist of Melanie’s hand. It’s perfect. It’s everything.

“More,” Sasha demands again. The jerking of her body is erratic, her breathing drawn in staccato beats, and Melanie rubs the heel of her palm more sharply against Sasha’s clit.

“Yes, always, forever.” Her promises are lost to Sasha’s keening and her own desperate breaths, seeking Sasha’s orgasm and her own emotional satisfaction.

The rain beats down, and the books lie forgotten beneath the table.

In several months time Melanie can’t recall why the rain leads her to pressing her own fingers into the core of herself, desperately trying to recall a face she swears she’s never seen before.


End file.
